Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

Biography

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was born in Aradan, Iran, in 1956 into a poor family. He studied civil engineering at the Iran University of Science and Technology, joined its faculty as a lecturer in 1989, and earned a doctorate in transportation planning there in 1997. After the 1979 revolution he joined the Office for Strengthening Unity, and in 1993 he became the first governor general of the newly created Ardabil Province, serving until 1997.

Tehran's city council elected him mayor in 2003, and he reversed many of the reforms of earlier moderate mayors. Backed by the conservative Alliance of Builders of Islamic Iran, he won the 2005 presidential runoff with 62 percent of the vote and took office in August 2005.

His presidency was divisive at home and abroad. Critics faulted his economic policies and human rights record, and he promoted Iran's nuclear program, repeatedly called for Israel's destruction and denied the Holocaust. His disputed re-election in 2009 set off mass protests. In his second term he clashed with parliament and with Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, and in 2012 he became the first president of the Islamic Republic summoned to answer questions before parliament.

After leaving office in 2013 he was appointed to the Expediency Discernment Council. The Guardian Council rejected his bid to run for president again in 2017, and later attempts to register in 2021 and 2024 were also turned down.